Been looking at these new fangled bits of machinery from a total beginners perspective. Yes I have owned a dac for the last 20 years but it resides in my cd player. I am totally confused but know I want musicality without spending too much and the final digital solution must be better than what I already have. Also I don't mind diy although I have never soldered a surface mount chip with more than 8 legs (opamps).

Looking at the net the likes of Beresford, Hegel and Metrum crop up often. I looked at the Beresford seg as it is cheap, sold direct and the designer is active on the forums - seems like a good bloke. The thing is about the seg - it has all sorts of bells and whistles that I don't need. Headphone amp, volume control and gawd knows what else. So in that sense I am paying for bits I will not use.

I don't want to spend an absolute fortune and want something I will not be scared of pulling the lid off and shoving the soldering iron in.

whats your current CD Player? Is this to be used as an add on to the CD or for a streaming solution?

What connectivity do you need? USB, TOSLINK, Coax SPdif?

CDP is a 1997 Naim CD3.5 with lots of modifications by me. Does not have a digital out because Naim did not believe in them at the time (they changed their minds later on ) If I got a transport it would probably be the Cambridge Audio one that a few on here have.

I have no idea what connectivity I will need. I have considered a Pi but don't know where I am going to store anything yet. It would be good to have something that is adaptable to change i.e as my knowledge improves I can swap bits of the chain in and out.

Stu, if you look at the 3 parts Doc mentioned, you only need the USB to SPDIF if the device you use has no SPDIF output, whether thats a computer or not really

Well i am going to need a dac for sure as the Naim CDP will be a totally different thing. It has no digital in or out at all so can only be used as a stand alone cd player. I am not clever enough to hack into the digital workings of it so it will be used to play cd's and nothing else. Or if my dabblings with file based audio are no better than the cdp, it will remain my main digital source.

I will rip some of the cd's i have got to be used on this new totally separate digital source. Plus streaming may come into it at some point once i am up and running and know what i am doing. Getting to grips with the language people use concerning file based audio is quite daunting so dont know if i am making myself clear or not.

I think the Audioquest Dragonflys are good value, the red being worth the extra over the black. They are headphone amplifiers which can be used with a main system. They are so small they can fit into your pocket with a phone containing lossless files.

I set a course just east of Lyra
And northwest of Pegasus
Flew into the light of Deneb
Sailed across the Milky Way

I think the Audioquest Dragonflys are good value, the red being worth the extra over the black. They are headphone amplifiers which can be used with a main system. They are so small they can fit into your pocket with a phone containing lossless files.

on a similar theme I use a Cyrus Soundkey pocket DAC with my android phone and its very impressive